This is my twelfth year of imprisonment in Kanatar Prison,
with no changes in the sanitary conditions or prison standards.

The prison population has outgrown its capacity with eight to
fifteen inmates per cell, resulting in a strain on the
ventilation and sanitation systems.

We have a 4 1/2 by 1 1/2 space in which to sleep.
We sleep on the floor with one pillow, one blanket and one
bedsheet.

The windowless rooms are overcrowded. There is a narrow
opening covered with iron netting in the wall of each cell but
air circulation is still restricted.

Each cell has a one foot by one foot toilet hole in the floor.
This is also the only area we have in which to do laundry, take
baths and wash cooking utensils. Water is often limited and must
be hand carried from the fire emergency pipe at the front of the
administration building.

We cook our food individually in private pots and stoves
inside the poorly ventilated and crowded cells. Vegetables and
other cooking items are available from the prison canteen at a
far higher price than the market value because the prison
administration collects interest and taxes on every single item
sold inside prison.

It is highly important for prisoners to have a reasonable
amount of money deposited in the prison accounts department to
meet the high cost of feeding, laundry and medicare.

The hospital is always out of stock with essential tablets.
God only knows how many prisoners have lost their lives to the
empty hospital. Prisoners without money to provide for medication
usually dont make it through the hospital.

The official diet is broad beans for breakfast, tasteless,
ill-prepared and unfit for consumption. Dinner comes with a plate
of rice and a few drops of lentil soup and five pieces of bread
for the day. Meat is only once a week, one piece for every
prisoner.

Prisoners like myself who cannot afford the extra cost of
buying food to supplement the poor diet have no choice but to
live with whatever food is available, to which most stomach
infections are attributed.

The entire prison system depends on contributions from
well-to-do inmates who have a little more to spare. Items like
fans, electric lamps, mosquito nets, and a host of many others
are included on this list.

Sports are equally provided for through contributions from
rich prisoners. Footballs, racket balls, bats Ping-Pong tables,
balls, etc., are all paid for by those who are in good financial
position in order to live a better life behind bars.

The good news is we can receive Christian literature through
the mail and we Christians are permitted to come together twice
weekly to give thanks and prayers to the Lord and Master, Jesus
Christ. Please pray that we may continue to receive the strength
to overcome the cruelty of living behind bars.

Please send us books, magazines and Bible correspondence
courses. I hope that you may be able to help with my requests.

I am a senior member in the prison prayer group. We dont
have any Christians visiting us from the outside. I am living in
the midst of a Muslim majority. We Christians number only 15.

There is no parole or pardon. They do not lack discipline
here. All inmates are treated the same. In 2005 I am to receive
freedom. I am 34 years old and single.

I need correspondence with other Christians. Please arrange
for someone to visit me here in this Egyptian prison. I pray the
Lord Jesus Christ will give you strength. On behalf of myself and
the others in here, we look forward to hearing from you soon.
Philemon 1:8.